Green Infrastructure Mapping

April 8, 2008

Openlands and the Center for Neighborhood Technology have developed a Green Infrastructure Mapping tool to create customized maps to identify and protect the natural resources of the region. The project embraces a geographic scope of 19 counties in northeast Illinois, northwest Indiana, and southeast Wisconsin and over 400 GIS layers of natural resource data.

Initially, the organizations collected natural resource and sustainability data and made them available at www.greenmapping.org. It soon became clear that the data would be more useful if they were put into an interactive format accessible to the general public. The result is the interactive green infrastructure mapping website which gives the user the ability to target specific geographic regions and pick appropriate data layers to create maps.

Lenore Beyer-Clow, from Openlands, and Peter Haas, from CNT, illustrated the capabilities of the interactive website as a planning tool. The presentation included examples of maps that can be used to advocate for the protection of natural resources, air and water quality, and recreational open space across the region.

About the Speaker

Lenore Beyer-Clow is the Policy Director at Openlands, a regional conservation organization. At Openlands, Ms. Beyer-Clow plans, implements, and coordinates the organization's policy agenda. She manages projects to protect water quantity and quality and advocates for the protection of land and natural resources across the region.

Beyer-Clow was previously the Executive Director of the McHenry County Defenders, a citizen advocacy environmental organization. She holds a Masters in Business Administration (MBA) from the University of Illinois and a B.A. from Oberlin College.

Peter M. Haas is the Manager of the Geographic Research and Information Dept. for the Center for Neighborhood Technology. Haas is a physicist working on the technical aspects of environmental and social science. As director of the Geographical Research and Information Department at the Center for Neighborhood Technology (CNT), Haas developed CNT's GIS capability, creating maps and analysis for CNT's environmental, economic, and geographical work. His division is also responsible for CNT's web development, creating online tools and calculators, and developing community information systems.